The Truth about Chi

[shogeri]

Another, or shall I say, a better word for 'chi', 'ki' is 'work'...we can bring it all together and into a simple and yet diverse package of making your body do as it needs to do in a physiological manner, along with training your brain to realize just how important of a role that it plays as well in the whole scheme of 'chi'...it only becomes occultish or spiritual when a person makes it that way...if your mind slips into la-la land during meditation, you have simply trained your brain to find the thresh-hold of consciousness similar to that of sleep. No magic, or hocus pocus...just working toward learning the balance between relaxation, the work your body does, and how you can tap into that for your well being, and or health, or for the Martial benefits as well.

later!

[KarateOx]

There are a lot of ways to describe Chi/ki. I call it intent.

Intent? Allow me to explain.

Have you ever walked into a wall, door, parking meter, pole, etc.? Why is it, that, no matter how fast or hard you try, you can never hit it as bad or hard as you do when you hit it accidentally? You can run at a wall and slam into it trying to relive the infamous moment, and it will never be the same. Yet, simply walking, turning the corner, and walking into someone knocks BOTH of you silly. Why? You were walking, not running? Because your body didn't know there was a wall, pole, etc., there. It was 100% committed to walking through that particular space. Your energy goes THROUGH the space, even if your body does not. This, I believe, is chi. when the body is completely relaxed, it hits harder or moves more powerfully then if it is tense and ready. If this can be channeled and used in a striking technique, it would be oh so much more powerful. Can I do it? No.... not yet. LOL. Not very mystical, I know, but this, I think, is the begining of my understanding of the energy transfer we call chi. The honest intent for this energy to go somewhere.

[JusticeZero]

Most of the "chi" exercises I see done that have real measurable effects, "chi" is actually used as a visualization and directing/organizing principle. The concept of "chi" is in these exercizes used to produce natural physiological and structural dynamics - not "mystical energy" but muscle, bone, and leverage effects - in ways which are very difficult to verbally explain. If I use a "chi" visualization, I can skip over a large amount of frustrated attempts to explain rather involved issues of physiology, leverage, anatomy, etc. and get straight to the student doing the movement correctly.

Furthermore, I have noted that people are unwilling to accept that skills that they cannot personally do are done with practice and skill, and instead demand a magical and supernatural force to attribute the differences on. odd I know, but ymmv.

[bushido_man96]

There are a lot of ways to describe Chi/ki. I call it intent.

Intent? Allow me to explain.

Have you ever walked into a wall, door, parking meter, pole, etc.? Why is it, that, no matter how fast or hard you try, you can never hit it as bad or hard as you do when you hit it accidentally? You can run at a wall and slam into it trying to relive the infamous moment, and it will never be the same. Yet, simply walking, turning the corner, and walking into someone knocks BOTH of you silly. Why? You were walking, not running? Because your body didn't know there was a wall, pole, etc., there. It was 100% committed to walking through that particular space. Your energy goes THROUGH the space, even if your body does not. This, I believe, is chi. when the body is completely relaxed, it hits harder or moves more powerfully then if it is tense and ready. If this can be channeled and used in a striking technique, it would be oh so much more powerful. Can I do it? No.... not yet. LOL. Not very mystical, I know, but this, I think, is the begining of my understanding of the energy transfer we call chi. The honest intent for this energy to go somewhere.

This is an interesting way to view this subject. Thanks for pointing it out like this; it gives me a visualization, anyways. Its kind of a funny one, too, because just this morning, I thought my bedroom door was open when I attemtped to walk through it....

[tonydee]

I'm no expert on these things, but given the surprising lack of people describing this side of things, I'll chip in with what I can for whatever it's worth.

For context: I have studied some internal arts: tai chi chuan, bagua, hapkido, aikido, hwarinmu. Listing hapkido might surprise many, but my master absolutely believed in chi/ki, and we spent considerable time in various exercises. He also taught me tai chi chuan, which he'd clearly been obsessively into at one stage, learning 3 or 4 different family styles and at least half a dozen major patterns culminating in the 108 (?) movement form. I study the Modern Yang style of

.

I can clearly feel a sensation of chi whenever I choose to do the exercises or focus my mind on it, and sometimes when/after doing external martial arts training. Subjectively, it feels like there are magnets in your body, and you can change their strength and polarity, moving your limbs to new positions by first willing the electromagnetic fields to move, then the body slides smoothly into the new positions. Still, at this very conscious level, I am unable to cause a change in these fields sufficient to provide any vaguely fast motion.

You "discover" seeming trajectories of powerful motion around your body that contradict everything an external martial art teaches. For example, one such movement might start with the palm facing behind you, and held 45 degrees outwards from the front shoulder, elbow down, biceps curled, then twist into a palm strike as if hitting a target in front of your sternum. From the perspect of an external art, such a movement might at best generate a slap, and seem pretty much incompatible with efficient reconnection to strong body-mechanical support. Still, it just feels right from an internal energy perspective. Such strikes do appear to be used in the internal arts, even for brick breaking.

You can also feel strangely aware of your own surface: you can slide your arms along each other with your eyes closed, and seem to have a heightened awareness of positioning so your hands glide smoothly at miniscule distances from your opposite arm. Bit silly and useless, but just mentioning it because it's a very characteristic subjective perception.

Do I believe it's meaningful or useful in a mystical way? No - I've absolutely no evidence of that, and am disinclined to believe it. I haven't convinced myself that it's even vaguely significant except subjectively: if it is an electromagnetic field, wouldn't there be just a tinge of static charge to make a tiny piece of paper, or a compass needle, move? When I stand there feeling a strong energy flow between my hands - why can't I feel something change when someone else passes their hand between mine? Why can't some chi gung master do something to claim $1 million dollars from James Randi... I've checked his web site and he does accept proposals to do the kinds of things chi gung legends are made of, and only expects them to be demonstrated on the humblest scale. For example: turning a piece of paper on a table under controlled conditions.

But, as KarateOx points out, chi/ki training does help one relax through a strike, giving 100% commitment, and that makes a huge difference. Where I might have struck a 60kg bag more tentatively with a tightly clenched fist in the past, I now prefer to strike with an open palm, and I force myself to approach the strike with the expectation that the arm will lock out as far as I want it to, and the bag will be flung backwards as if weightless. In general, it works - my arm is no longer an impediment in expressing the power from my legs, torso etc.. I have to swing the bag in towards me hard to get much feeling of impact. Has it got anything to do with chi/ki? No - probably not - but the training that promotes chi/ki feeling gets the body prepared for such movements.

Another related observation: due to various racquet sports, an old injury to my left wrist, my own sometimes unbalanced emphasis in training, spending more time in right arm arm wrestles at high school, etc. my right arm is considerably stronger than my left. But when I strike with the palm in this fashion, both arms produce similar power, as the strikes aren't employing arm power. That's very different to my clenched-fist punches of old. It feels liberating.

So, do I idolise chi/ki? No... I think martial arts training with or without converges towards the same relaxation and explosive power... different sides of the mountain, but all climbing to the top.

Cheers,

Tony

[Truestar]

Maybe I'm not understanding what people are saying, would you say Ki is more a development of the mind, or would you say to some extent it does exist?

I just recently affiliated myself with a new instructor. While I still instruct at my home school I am also training with him, a Grandmaster in Japanese Arts. Just yesterday we did an exercise working with Ki.

I went towards it with an open mind, not expecting greatness but not pushing the thought out that maybe I'll feel the energy. Without the power of suggestion I did indeed feel something. Without opening my eyes I felt a tingling in my finger tips, when I explained this he told me to open my eyes. His hand was just about with mine, maybe an inch or two away but his fingers were lined up with mine. He didn't ask if I felt anything in my fingers, he simply asked what I felt.

Now, obviously when I said something he could have put his hand there, but I don't believe that's so. I'm open to the concept of Ki. I think it can be projected, but not to the point where you can kill somebody with it or levitate.

[tonydee]

Maybe I'm not understanding what people are saying, would you say Ki is more a development of the mind, or would you say to some extent it does exist?

At the simplest level, chi/ki training encourages the mind to allow the body to relax further, which then creates a potential for more dynamic explosive movement. I believe the training is effective in producing better body utilisation, but to this end I don't see it even matters whether ki is "real". Whether you consciously do exercises for it, or you work on the same aspects of relaxation and explosiveness in another fashion, the results are the same as far as I can tell.

At more advanced levels, chi/ki is supposed to allow you to sense changes in your opponent's intent even before they start to move. What your Grandmaster demonstrated - an inter-personal sensitivity - is heading in this direction. I personally have seen nothing to convince me that this is possible. There were some direct tests of this aspect of ki - apparently called satki - in the

production by the BBC.

Cheers, Tony

[shogeri]

qi or chi is real. its not part of a belief system since they have done scientic study of the effects of chi manipulation on animals, especially on horses. if your brain doubts chi (energy, or work) then of course you will inhibit your ability to tie into it with your intent or yi. when you sleep your brain tries to balance itself in many ways. when you are hurt the body does what it can to heal itself sending energy and blood and fluctuating temperatures etc to that point or area. no hocus pocus or mystic voodoo, just an other persective in adition to the often harsh ways of western medicine. later!

[Zaine]

Just my opion, but I'm typically a nay sayer on his kind of thing.

I think that a vast majority of feats attribuited ti Ki or Chi are actually the appropriate and forceful application of leverege, body weight and fight mechanics.

Pressure point stuff may have some application, but again I think that this is due more to the physiology of the human body rather than some sort of energy force created by all living things (sorry for the reference there ).

As such, I really don't beleive the wild claims I've heard from some people, ie. levetation.

Well some believe that chi is nothing more that physiology. In all actuallity I think that chi is very scientifically grounded in anatomy via the meridian points in our body, which direct blood flow and how much of it goes where. If a meridian is obstructed then you could actually die in some cases. This is where acupuncture comes in. It helps to promote blood flow which can cure a good amount of ailments. Pressure points actually have nothing to due with chi, they are simply sensitive areas where nerves have clustered.

As far as the original question goes though, most of it is real, but as far as the levitation and stuff goes, I would stack that to something higher than chi, what it is I have no idea, but I wouldn't call it chi.

[RichardZ]

Just my opion, but I'm typically a nay sayer on his kind of thing.

I think that a vast majority of feats attribuited ti Ki or Chi are actually the appropriate and forceful application of leverege, body weight and fight mechanics.

Pressure point stuff may have some application, but again I think that this is due more to the physiology of the human body rather than some sort of energy force created by all living things (sorry for the reference there ).

As such, I really don't beleive the wild claims I've heard from some people, ie. levetation.

I have to somewhat agree. Chi is demonstrated in a much too quasi fantasy cosmic jumbo. And those who believe in it, like a faith in a religion, tend to try and explain what they feel or think. Some say, the blood or nerve pathways-signals are Chi. Some say Chi is energy like electro-magnetic or other electro field.

I rather look upon what Chi may not be.

I dont think it is a ultimate super human to be proven by such magic or parlor tricks.

I dont think, it can be measured to fully explain per how one believes it should work.

I dont think total faith in it should prevail over comon sense or scientific explanation.

Chi has never gotten me anything that I truly needed in life thus far.